Bibilashvili at Constitutional Court: Investigation of Kakha Kaladze's Brother's Murder Became Possible Only After 2003

Zaza Bibilashvili, a representative of the "National Movement," stated in his rebuttal at the Constitutional Court that before 2003, kidnapping people for ransom was a form of business, and no one was surprised by it. According to him, the victim of such a kidnapping was the younger brother of the high-ranking plaintiff, Kakha Kaladze, Levan, who was abducted and killed by criminals.

According to Bibilashvili, the investigation of this case became possible only after the "Rose Revolution," when the government changed and the political will emerged. According to him, the investigation revealed that everything had its authors and that there were people in state agencies who covered it up. Bibilashvili said the case was opened very quickly, and Kaladze thanked the then government and specific individuals.

"Before 2003, life in Georgia for an ordinary law-abiding person was hell. Georgia was one of the most criminal states," he said. According to Bibilashvili, criminal bosses and heads of so-called law enforcement agencies were jointly involved in the kidnapping business, while the number of abductees was in the dozens and possibly hundreds, including foreign and local businesspeople.

In his assessment, "this criminal hell was not an objective reality" but a matter of political will: before 2003 there was no will, or the state and the criminal world were fully intertwined, and in 2003 the will to establish order emerged.

Bibilashvili also spoke about contract killings before 2003 and named Gia Chanturia, Soliko Khabeishvili, Kakhi Asatiani and Giorgi Sanaia as examples. According to him, practically all cases of these murders remain unsolved or have been solved in a way that does not deserve public trust.

According to his statement, after the "Rose Revolution" this practice stopped and no similar contract murder occurred, although it was revived from 2012. He mentioned the murder of Levan Kachkarava, which, according to him, remains uninvestigated and will one day be investigated, like the case of Kaladze's brother, when there is political will for it.